


To Kill a King

by ArborMist



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Gen, TYL
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-03 02:21:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2834621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArborMist/pseuds/ArborMist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reborn hasn't killed in fifteen years and Tsuna won't answer him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Kill a King

He hasn’t killed anyone in such a long time. He’s spent so many years training children into pillars of Mafioso strength, shooting them with bullets that never truly kill, his hands tied and told over and over never to kill, don’t interfere, protect yourself but  _never_   _kill_. A thin tendril of smoke snakes from the end of his gun. He’s defended himself over the years, the eight years since he was cursed into a baby form, and the six years after that he spent reverting to his original age.

He hasn’t taken a life in almost fifteen years. The gun smokes. He hasn’t killed anyone because the Ninth told him not to. He hasn’t killed anyone because Tsuna told him not to. He stares at the body lying in front of him, can taste the copper in the air from the twenty three others that he mowed down making his way here.

Instinctively, he draws the gun closer to his body, eyes darting around the room and dismissing shadows. Silence rings through the room. With a flick of his wrist, the gun disappears and Leon climbs wearily up on to his shoulder. The men in front of him are all dead. He hasn’t killed in fifteen years.

The disconnect is familiar. Reborn tilts his hat, words that he’d long abandoned spilling from his lips.  _Your sins have been purged. Your life has been corrected. Go with peace._ Turning, he makes his way out of the room, bypassing the bodies splattered against the walls, moving past the bullets that smoke in the wall. He makes his way down the familiar hallway and puts his hand on a familiar door. The blood covering his fingers causes him pause.

“It’s safe,” he calls, before pushing the door open. The silence makes his skin itch, momentarily reconnects him with the horrors he had committed. It doesn’t last long. Something important needs to be seen to. There’s copper on his tongue, sticking to his teeth, and he swallows it easily. “Tsuna.”

The shadows shift and Leon is in his hand before he can blink, before he can truly ascertain whether a threat has been poised. Yamamoto raises his hands, eyes hard and a little sad. Reborn notes the blood creasing the lines of his palm. He doesn’t lower his gun.

“Where?”

His demand is meant with silence. Yamamoto watches him cautiously, and Reborn will never admit the tremor that runs through his hand in that moment. “ _Where_.”

The creak of the door behind him makes him dizzy, and he swings to face it, furious with his sudden inadequacy. He hadn’t checked the rest of the rooms. He had left people milling about. More than twenty four, always more, how could he leave the job unfinished. But it’s Lambo who stands in the doorway, leaning heavily against the handle, a cut slashed up the side of his face and one of his horns missing. He doesn’t smile when he sees Reborn, instead looks beyond him to Yamamoto. Lambo is fifteen. He should not be bloody. Tsuna would not allow it.

“Tell me,” Reborn grates out, ignoring the hitch in his voice. 

“It’s the same day,” Yamamoto says, his voice just above a whisper and laced with terror. Reborn trembles. He ignores it. “Today is the same day.”

“Tell me!” he snarls. The gun wavers. Lambo nods and disappears from the doorway. Reborn hastens to follow and barely notices when Yamamoto shadows him.

There are more bodies in the hallway Lambo leads them down, some missing limbs, others beaten into unrecognizable shapes. They’re all dead. Lambo doesn’t seem to notice, picks his way over the mess of broken limbs until he reaches the stairs leading up. Reborn’s heartbeat kicks up. Tsuna would never corner himself upstairs. He would never move where he could not easily defend.

Tsuna hadn’t answered him.

He takes the stairs two at a time, Lambo scrambling to keep ahead of him. The silence pervades, not even a murmur disturbing the blood soaked air. Lambo leads and Reborn follows, the gun still in his hand. He hadn’t realized there were so many. Stupid, stupid. Soft. Too soft. He hasn’t killed in fifteen years. Lambo is fifteen.

Less bodies greet them up here, but all of them are dead, all of them marked by Flame. Reborn clenches his free hand tight. The Flames look like Sun, Mist, and Cloud. No Sky. He swallows against the ticking in his chest, his heartbeat a rabbit filled with fear. Lambo still hasn’t spoken.

Suddenly, noise. Reborn darts forward, hauling Lambo back behind him by the collar of his shirt. It’s a groan of pain, of distress, and Reborn doesn’t hesitate to step forward. He’s unprepared for the merciless way Hibari caves in the dying man’s head.

Hibari looks up, tonfa dripping fresh blood, his body hanging with exhaustion. His jacket is gone, and his shirt has come untucked. His eyes narrow. “Go. Hurry.”

Lambo nods and moves past him, leading again, eyes darting away from the carnage. Reborn disconnects. Lambo does not have that luxury. He wonders fleetingly if any of them do; Tsuna certainly doesn’t.

With a quick step, Lambo leads him down a long hallway, and there at the end, there finally, he sees the scars of the Sky. His breath hitches and he pushes past Lambo, thoughts a stutter in his head. Fifteen years. No, no, eight years. Nothing before, nothing before.

He wrenches on the handle of the door, ignoring the blur of Storm Flames that hold it closed.  _Let me in, let me in_. If the Sky Flames are still fresh, Tsuna must still be alive. Today is not the day. He will die before Tsuna will. Gritting his teeth, he pushes his Flames up against the Storm, waiting for the recognition. The Flames disappear and Reborn shoves open the door.

Tsuna didn’t answer before, but he does now.

“Reborn,” Tsuna says, breathless, fingers tucked against his chest. There’s blood there, painting the sides of his fingers, covering the lines of his gloves. His eyes are lit by Flame, but it’s fading. Gokudera turns back to bandaging Tsuna’s leg, his boxes losing their Flame. His shoulders sit stiff and uncertain. He doesn’t speak.

He’s no longer able to disconnect. He only killed twenty four. He counted over sixty dead in the hallways, and who knows how many in the rooms. He hasn’t killed in fifteen years, but none of these children have killed in their lifetimes. Tsuna smiles at him, unsteady, and Reborn moves. The Sun is his weapon, but it can be used in more ways than that. He falls to his knees in front of Tsuna, fingers closing over the hand pressed sloppily against that shuddering chest. He can feel the way the lung has collapsed, at the way Tsuna’s blood rushes out of him through the holes carved in his skin. Reborn feels sick.

Digging deep, Reborn grabs the core of his Flame, fans it high and bright until it blinds the room, blinds him to Tsuna’s face. He presses his fingers close to the gaping wound in Tsuna’s chest and feels it knit together under his palm, lung and muscle and skin. He draws a hand down Tsuna’s thigh, to where the bandage sits soaked through and already heavy, and pushes until the wounds begin to close. He corrects the bones that sit fractured and threaten the repair of Tsuna’s lung. He soothes the pain that radiates from Tsuna’s hand, two fingers broken and his palm scoured by gunpowder flashing hot.

Reborn reaches up and cradles Tsuna’s face, unmarking pierced skin and smoothing away bruises.

When he’s done, he’s exhausted. His Flame peters out and falls into slumber, taking with it the ability for Reborn to ignore his own wounds. He does it anyway, burying the need to rest until he’s certain. Tsuna blinks at him, eyes bright and cheeks flushed with colour, and Reborn rubs a thumb over the blush. Tsuna lifts his hand, skin still covered with his own blood, and curls his fingers gently around Reborn’s wrist.

“Not today,” he says, and Reborn closes his eyes. He leans forward until his forehead touches Tsuna’s. Eight years is a long time, but he hopes for more. Tsuna wraps his other hand around the back of his neck, matching the rhythm of Reborn’s breath. His nose bumps against Reborn’s. “Not today.”

Reborn let’s himself relax, if for a moment. Because he hasn’t killed in fifteen minutes, but he will kill again.


End file.
